Jewish Leaders Mourn Late President

October 8, 1974

NEW YORK (Oct. 7)

Jewish leaders continued today to express sorrow over the death of Shnuer Zalman Shazar. Mrs. Charlotte Jacobson, chairman of the World Zionist Organization-American Section, described the late President as “one of the heroic figures of the Zionist movement and the State of Israel.” She observed, “He had the skills necessary for leadership” including “spellbinding oratory and a highly persuasive pen, accompanied by a thorough knowledge of Jewish tradition and commitment to its values.”

The National Committee for Labor Israel referred to the late President Shazar as “a man of vast learning, great warmth and profound respect for the dignity of working people in Israel and throughout the world.” The statement continued: “Since his first mission to the United States as an emissary of Histadrut in 1927, Zalman Shazar maintained the closest personal contacts with countless Americans linked to the ideals and echievements of Histadrut. He inspired us to believe in the triumph of the prophetic ideal of social justice in the independent democratic State of Israel.”

AN ILLUSTRIOUS, INSPIRING FIGURE

Dr. Nahum Goldmann, president of the World Jewish Congress, said: “With the death of Zalman Shazar, Israel loses one of its outstanding moral and intellectual leaders; the Jewish people one of its most illustrious and inspiring figures; and I personally one of my closest friends with whom I had been associated for over half a century” in the WJC.

President Shazar, Dr. Goldmann continued, “was one of the last survivors of a generation of Jewish leaders who combined deep Jewish learning with a profound knowledge of modern secular culture. He was a prodigious writer, a distinguished, scholar, and a fascinating orator. He was, too, a person of great integrity and moral stature….He will go down in the annals of Jewish history as one of the most remarkable men of a unique Jewish generation.”

CONDOLENCE BOOK AT NY CONSULATE GENERAL

Mrs. Henry N. Rapaport, president of the Women’s League for Conservative Judaism, said that President Shazar “will be missed not only for the talents of mind he demonstrated as educator, scholar, philosopher and statesman, but for the spiritual qualities which guided his daily living, and which he imparted to all who came in contact, with him.”

The office of the Israel Consul General in New York announced today that due to the death of President Shazar a condolence book will be available for signature at the Consulate General of Israel at 800 Second Ave., 14th floor, Thursday and Friday between 10 a.m. and 3 p.m.